glitzpitfanaticfandomcom-20200214-history
Chapter 17 - An Unlikely Pact (CitC)
"Game over, Clubbette. Get out of here." Tubba snarled at his half-sister, who lay dazed on the floor at his feet. "You're already at the door, scram!" Clubbette looked up at him, a flickering flame of defiance in her eyes. "I believed that my knowledge of the Mushroom Kingdom could help you in the war to reclaim our Kingdom." "When has it been our ''Kingdom?" ''Tubba asked indignantly. "You've been trying to separate yourself from the Kingdom from the day you were born!" However, with Kamek and Morton watching the argument intently behind him, Tubba knew he couldn't say much more. As far as they were aware, he had joined the Koopa Troop and had given up all hopes of saving his own Kingdom. "We had the same father. My knowledge can be helpful, I've been living in the Mushroom Kingdom for the past four years!" Clubbette stood up again, glaring daggers at Tubba. "That Kingdom is as much as yours as it is mine." Tubba snorted. "Well, that's on you. We're not getting it back. I've joined the Koopa Troop." Turning his back on his half-sister, he picked up Gonzales club and handed it to him, determinedly not making eye contact with Morton or Kamek. "Still, my knowledge can be helpful to the Koopa Troop." Clubbette argued, taking a few strides to stand beside Tubba again. "I want to stay and I will stay!" "No! Get out of here!" Tubba growled angrily, turning around in a fury. "We don't want you! Get out!" Tubba viciously pointed toward the door, not caring how deranged he must look to the other battlers and the Koopas. "No." A deep voice boomed behind him. Having came up unnoticed(which took some doing, since he towered at nine feet) was Bowser the Koopa King. He lingered behind the group, his limbs taut with anger and his eyes furrowed. "Tubba." He spoke low and calm, which was surprising, judging by the way he clenched his fist together as he stood. "It is not your place to kick people out of my castle. That power is mine. You have begun to work here, and we are making use of your talents at your consent. There's no reason Clubbette can't do the same." Snickering in disbelief, Tubba shook his head. "No way, Bowser!" He exclaimed, shaking his head violently. "You don't know my-" "Enough!" Bowser roared, licks of smoke puffing out from his nostrils, his orange hair shaking. "I have grudgingly allowed you to join the Koopa Troop, Tubba! Don't waste it! I suggest you go back and work with Ludwig and Iggy!" Without waiting for a reply, Bowser turned around and strode back in the direction of the Throne Hall, the torchlight casting eerie shadows of his hulking figure on the stone walls and red carpets. A silence descended on those left in the Entrance Hall. Everyone was looking at Tubba, who stood still, breathing heavily as rage pulsed through him, clenching his fist in disgust and fury. He didn't dare turn around and look at Clubbette, knowing that she would wear a look of arrogance and victory, as if she had fought him and won. Kamek broke the silence, his elderly voice quivering. "Right, you there... dark blue Clubba, green Blooper, white Barribad, ghost Shy Guy and green Bandit... come with me. Morton, stay with these two until I come and fetch them. I can trust you to ensure they don't tear the heads off each other. " Hardly hearing the last part, Tubba had turned around at the mention of ghost Shy Guy and green bandit. Completely unnoticed to him in his fury over Clubbette's return, he hadn't noticed that two others of his well known friends had returned. One was Xavier, the green bandit who constantly had a wish to kill his brother, and the other was Dibby, a ghost Shy Guy who was once a guard at the Glitz Pit, but had left after a fire led to her ghost-health declining. Dibby appeared to be holding Xavier by the leg, who seemed completely unpeturbed by the fact he was floating by one leg in midair. "What's with him?" Asked Tubba, before Dibby could go along with Kamek. Dibby stopped, smirked, and exchanged a glance with Gonzales, Blizzerd and GB, all of whom who had stopped as well. "They had a little mix-up with a Kremling en route to Pipe Land. Xavier's been in a weird state for days. If Clubbette and I hadn't been travelling nearby, they would've been shredded." Dibby explained, grinning as she recounted the story. "You really have Clubbette wrong, you know." She added in an undertone so that only Tubba could hear her. But before Tubba could do much more than say "Yeah, right," Kamek swept Dibby and the others had walked away down one of the various halls of the Castle. Tubba turned pointedly away from Clubbette. To his disgust, he felt her scaled hand tapping his shoulder. He turned around angrily, but Clubbette was holding one fat finger to her lips, angling her eyes at Morton, who was standing in the corner snacking on what looked like Cluckboom meat. "What?" Tubba said in a hushed, irritable tone. "I know fully well you don't intend to give up on the Kingdom. I know you'll double cross them. Let me help you!" Clubbette offered, taking glances at Morton, who still seemed wrapped up in his Cluckboom meat. Ignoring the panic lancing through him as Clubbette revealed his plans, Tubba shook his head. "No way! This is my job." He snapped, struggling to keep his voice low. They continued to argue in low, hushed tones, casting worried looks at Morton, until a roar went up from the basement, that shook the very Castle itself. The effect was immediate, disrupting everyone on the ground floor. Morton dropped his Cluckboom meat, Clubbette and Tubba exchanged confused glances, and soldiers around the area ran to the sound of the noise. But before they could get much farther than the hallway to the basement, they were barreled over by a blue-haired Iglator. Ludwig von Koopa was racing to the hallway toward the Throne Hall. screaming "Fazzer! Fazzer!", his blue hair askew in his haste to get to the Throne Hall. In a split second, all three of Tubba, Clubbette and Morton hared after Ludwig. * Two boos, one blue, and the other yellow, hovered under a thick, crisscrossing canopy of branches, making the floor littered with thickets and brambles look like it was shrouded with night, despite the sun hovering high above the branches. The boos were nearly identical in all manners except for colour, with bows hanging on their head and long, white teeth protruding from the top of their mouth. "You know, Meloetta... were we right to abandon the others and go to Boo Mansion?" The yellow one remarked, floating side by side with Meloetta. "It's not abandoning, Skeloetta!" Meloetta argued angrily. "There's no point getting ourselves in trouble until we know where the others are! They'll be fine! We're in Boo Mansion with countless Boos, someone will tell us where to go eventually! We grew up here, remember!" Skeloetta floated up and down in a passable imitation of a shrug. "I just don't like us sitting for two weeks, waiting, and hoping. Why aren't we out there, looking for them?" "Look, we vanished and disappeared from the battle before they all split up. We just have to hope they're alright." * Tubba and Clubbette had been halted at the door by a grizzled Koopatrol, who said that only the royal family was allowed entry to the Throne Hall. He therefore allowed Morton, who had lumbered behind them, panting, entry to the throne room. So there Tubba and Clubbette stood outside the red scaled door of the Throne Hall, completely in the dark to what was going on. Tubba angrily kicked some loose stones into the enchanted lava, swearing under his breath. Suddenly, the door to the Throne Hall opened. Both Clubbette, who had been sitting with her back to the door, and Tubba turned to see what was happening. Standing in the door was Larry Koopa, looking very disgruntled. Larry was the youngest of the Koopalings, having hardly changed from childhood aside from a slightly more mature face, stripped of its baby fat. "I'm here to fetch Clubbette. Dad feels her knowledge of the Mushroom Kingdom will be helpful to him." Larry spoke, his voice high and soft, and his eyes darting around the hall, settling on Clubbette. Tubba interjected: "I want to come too." "Sorry, Dad specifically said her." Larry seemed in a haste to re-enter the room, reeling off his words fast. Clubbette shook her head. "No, he can come. On one condition." She fixed Tubba with a meaningful look, and Tubba knew fully well what she was referring to. "Fine." Tubba sighed. He didn't want to agree to her demands, but he was truly very interested in what was going on. Ludwig was rarely flustered, and to run up in such a panic was another thing entirely. Larry, who had no arguments, beckoned the two of them into the Throne Hall. As the door closed behind him, Tubba knew that he had consented to Clubbette's share of the Clubba Kingdom.